Saturday, September 29, 2012

It's very exciting to see "Clipped" in the festival's full-color program. No, the novelty hasn't worn off yet for me.*

I'm also happy that they pulled a cool still from the film for the sidebar photo as it was one of my favorite shots of the production. Kirk set that one up by making Matt lay on the Brooklyn Heights sidewalk for about a half hour while people kept walking around us giving funny looks. The natural light was amazing as the sun was setting across the river.

Framing Matt's face upside-down was also a great choice that adds to the disjointed psyche of the character (JP) at this point in the film. In this shot, JP starts to smile, but to the viewer's brain seeing it inverted, initially processes it as a frown. Why is JP laying on the sidewalk having so many mixed emotions? Come down at 5pm and find out!

* PFAF's standard policy for programs is to list just one member of the team, and I was the lucky one. Just so there's no confusion, we are very much a team of four Guts, and would've preferred equal billing.

"Clipped" will be sandwiched between two high-profile films: "Steampunk Vs. Superhero," from Guy Loki Productions, who ran a successful Kickstarter campaign to fund their puppet- and prop-heavy production; and "Four Fists of Judgment," a highly choreographed action film from Justice Productions, the making of which was well documented on them YouTubes. Also in our block is "Gary's Got Game" from Joe Blodgett, who had one of my favorite films at last year's festival, and several other 2011 award winners.

All that translates to a great quality block of entertainment, and very stiff competition. As this is Team Guts Guts Guts Guts' first year submitting a film, we're in it mostly for the fun and experience, but there's no denying how awesome it would be to hear our friends and family cheering along when "Clipped" flashes on the big screen for the first time. If you're interested in checking out the screening, you can pick up a ticket through Ticketfly, and probably in person at the festival. We'll be in town from Thursday-Sunday checking out all the films, and hope to see you around.

One last thing... here's the official "Clipped" logline, if you haven't seen it already:

JP teeters on the brink of madness as he suffers alienation after being mysteriously robbed of a basic physical ability.
Totally vague dark dramedy comin' atcha!

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Team Guts Guts Guts Guts was not always a lean, mean, producing machine. Early on, we found that one of our weakest points was our inability to agree on a place to order food from, when to order it, and what we each wanted to eat. It was mildly annoying when it was just the four of us, but it was torture when we had hungry actors on the set, especially when we finally got the delivery, then had to taunt them with plates of food they couldn't eat during a dinner scene.

This is just a bit of what happened pretty much every time we got together:

Unfortunately, we didn't seem to get the hang of the food/work balance until the last few days of production, when we went for a staggered, Every Man For Himself feeding schedule so some of the team was always working hard while the others were fresh on the bench.

Monday, September 3, 2012

Designed by team member Alan Camuto, the Guts Guts Guts Guts team presents their official movie poster for their short film entitled "Clipped". Special thanks to Aisha L. Joseph for modeling her lovely hands!